Jesse Marsch had no use for Julen Lopetugui after being “shaken” by a horrifying injury to one of his stars Thursday night.
Marsch, Canada’s coach, threw his arms up and walked away from the Lopetugui during an animated postgame handshake with the opposing coach after Canada’s 6-0 win in Vancouver.
Star Ismael Kone suffered a gruesome left leg injury that resulted in him being stretchered off the field in the second half, and was set to undergo surgery after being taken to the hospital, per Marsch.
“Look, it happened right in front of the bench,” Marsch said. “We could all hear it. I knew right away. it was similar to when Tajon (Buchanan) got hurt in training (in 2024).
“It was right in front of us and everyone could hear the bone snap.”
Both Marsch and Lopetegui did not offer much on their incident.
Said Marsch: “I’m not spending one second, it’s not worth any of our time to discuss.”
Lopetegui stated after offering well wishes to Kone: “It’s between him and me.”
Canada had just put the finishing touches on its impressive win when the managers shook hands, with Lopetegui leaning in to say something in Marsch’s ear.
The two eventually separated a little while still holding hands, with both holding up their free hand, and Lopetegui kept going with his message.
When he grabbed Marsch’s right hand, the Canada coach shooed him away, threw his hands down dismissively and exited the scene.
Marsch added another hand dismissal for good measure.
While he didn’t say exactly what had him fired up, Marsch provided some details on what could have been the catalyst for his reaction.
Marsch said felt until the injury happened that the match had been “pretty good” when asked about Qatar’s physicality during the game.
He believed that Lopetegui probably gave the team an inspirational halftime message with his team trailing 3-0, and Marsch said that “led” before pausing himself.
“I don’t understand the reaction from their entire bench to try to start a fight about it being a red card when a clear foul just happened that broke a player’s leg,” he said. “Strange behavior.”
Kone suffered the injury when an aggressive slide from behind wiped him off his feet, and he landed hard in the 57th minute.
He immediately grabbed his left leg, and Qater’s Assim Madibo received a red card for the play.
The teams engaged in a skirmish after the match, perhaps due to the crushing injury.
“So your heart goes out to him, and everybody’s a little shaken by the whole experience because of the nature of the injury and also because Ismaël is a big part of the heart of our team,” Marsch said. “It will be a big loss for us. He’s been an amazing player in these last two games. You saw also that he was waving to the crowd and almost making everybody else feel at ease with the fact that he’s injured, and it’s an incredible statement about Ismaël as a person, but this is our team.I’ve been trying to tell people for two years about the special character of this group, and it gets highlighted in moments of challenging moments and in moments of glory. I think that today was a representation of all of that.
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